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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23754559">But All The Other Guides Do It...</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/maaaaa/pseuds/maaaaa'>maaaaa</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Sentinel (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 16:42:19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>508</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23754559</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/maaaaa/pseuds/maaaaa</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>23</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>But All The Other Guides Do It...</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Sometimes Sandburg seems incredibly, impossibly young.</p>
<p>Like now.</p>
<p>He’s huddled in a ball on the end of the couch, arms wrapped around his knees, dirty bare feet on the furniture in clear violation of the house rules.</p>
<p>The look he’s giving me is a classic ‘misunderstood, nobody wants to hear my side of it’ glare every petulant twelve year old has down pat…with those damn puppy dog eyes thrown in for good measure.</p>
<p>I’m not gonna let it work. I’m not.</p>
<p>He lied to me.</p>
<p>I know what you’re thinking.</p>
<p>How can anyone, especially a guide, lie to a sentinel?</p>
<p>I’m a human lie detector, right?</p>
<p>It doesn’t work that way. I mean, yes, I can tell if someone is lying to me, when I’m looking for it. And the person has to actually be lying, and know they’re lying.</p>
<p>Sandburg obfuscates.</p>
<p>Which in his mind isn’t lying.</p>
<p>He’s fidgeting now, and making with those pathetic heart-tugging sighs any up-to-my-eyeballs-in-deep-shit kid would be envious of.</p>
<p>Which might be a lot more effective if he weren’t still covered, and uncovered, in the evidence of his obfuscatory escapade.</p>
<p>Obfuscatory? Is that even a word?</p>
<p>Sometimes Sandburg makes me feel incredibly, impossibly old.</p>
<p>If he utters just one more ‘But Jiii-iim’…I swear I’ll put him over my knee.</p>
<p>I caught him red-handed participating in a mind bending, hallucinogenic mushroom-induced shamanistic ritual of some sort with a bunch of whacked out flower child wannabes who took a wrong turn somewhere back in the 70’s.</p>
<p>Can you believe that?</p>
<p>Okay…red-handed isn’t exactly right.</p>
<p>It was more like I caught him buck naked, with what I assume he thinks might be Chopec tribal markings painted all over his body…dancing…in the middle of a public park, no less, at 2 AM.</p>
<p>This was after he told me he’d found some sort of documentation saying all guides need to go on a self-discovery vision quest.</p>
<p>Right.</p>
<p>We discussed it. Calmly.</p>
<p>Oh, he tried the old ‘but all the other guides get to…’ routine, using the obligatory whiney voice, of course.</p>
<p>And I used the tried and true ‘I don’t care what all the other guides do…’counterpoint, implementing a properly stern tone and rigid stance.</p>
<p>He saw it my way.</p>
<p>Promised he wouldn’t do it.</p>
<p>End of discussion.</p>
<p>And then, the very next night, he turns around and scampers off to cavort in his birthday suit.</p>
<p>Of course, it wasn’t actually me who caught him.</p>
<p>Getting a call at 2AM from a hysterically laughing patrol office is always a joy.</p>
<p>I had to do some pretty fast-talking myself, let me tell you, to get his obfuscating little butt released to my custody and not arrested and hauled downtown.</p>
<p>The fidgeting has stopped.</p>
<p>He’s looking at me again, through the disheveled curls that obscure most of his face.</p>
<p>Damn.</p>
<p>This is it.</p>
<p>The look has changed to the ‘oh, man I really screwed up this time didn’t I and will Jim ever forgive me?’ pout.</p>
<p>I gotta go.</p>
<p>My guide needs me.</p>
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